A Misstatement

1895

Mrs. Spiffins had answered the doorbell of her suburban residence in person. There was a man at the threshold who politely touched the brim of a hat of the vintage of 1892 and began:

"Madam, I represent" —

He did not proceed. Mrs. Spiffins had recognized him instantly, and she interrupted his remarks:

"No, you don't represent! You misrepresent. You were here a year ago and represented that some seed you sold me were those of a celebrated flowering shrub from China, whose blossoms would give me joy the long summer through. When they grew up, I found you had palmed off pumpkin seeds on me. Now, if you don't git this instant, I'll break a broomstick over your back."

He got. — Pittsburg Chronicle-Telegraph.


Trees

I have written many verses, but the best poems that I have produced are the trees that I have planted on the hillside which overlooks the broad meadows scalloped and rounded at their edges by loops of the sinuous Housatonic. Nature finds rhymes for them in the recurring measures of the seasons. Winter strips them of their ornaments and gives them, as it were, in prose translation, and summer reclothes them in all the splendid phrases of their leafy language. — Oliver Wendell Holmes.


The Giant of the Bat Family

The king of the family Vespertilonidae is the gigantic fox bat of the Philippine islands. Specimens of this winged mammal procured for the Minnesota State University museum by the Menage expedition in 1892 are believed to be the largest examples of this species yet obtained by the naturalists, several individuals measuring more than 5 feet from tip to tip of their leathery wings and having heads and bodies as large as the American red fox. This creature has been fully described in "Notes For the Curious" under the heading of "A Flying Fox." — St. Louis Republic.


Not Necessary Now

"Well, Bessie," said her confidential friend, "you've been engaged now for three weeks. Does it seem as you expected it would?"
"Y-yes," replied Bessie, turning her engagement ring round and round on her finger, "only Herbert doesn't bring me any candy now." — Chicago Tribune.

Mow Those Weeds

1916

Have you mowed those weeds? Then your farm is worth more and you are a better neighbor and a better citizen than if you hadn't. Everyone thinks more of the farmer and farm if he sees the weeds neatly mowed as he drives along a well-dragged road. As he passes the end of the line fence, he sees a fence row, not a weed row, and the same is true of the cross fence.

Does this describe your farm? Then rabbit shooting may not be so good on it next winter, but buyers will offer you more an acre on it because they know it will take less work to make crops on it for a number of years than if all that weed seed had not been harvested. If you still have that weed crop to harvest, you will have to hurry. Weed seed is getting nearer ripe every day. The hot, dry weather has hurried ripening instead of belating it. Burr-pulling time is coming, and the horse weeds in the fence rows are getting harder for the mower or scythe to handle, but there is some consolation in the thought that there is still time to do a great deal of good, and that too early mowing might have let the weeds come up and make another crop of seed. — Exchange.

$1,000 an Acre From Dandelions

1901

The dandelion is but little grown in this country as a vegetable other than in some parts of New England. Some of the market gardeners in the vicinity of Boston claim to have taken as much as $1,000 worth from an acre. The variety known as the improved French thick leaved is the best and most generally grown. It is not at all particular as to soil or situation — in fact, it will thrive anywhere — but the larger profits are made in growing it on heavy loam, with good tilth. The seed should be sown soon after May 1, but good results are obtained when grown as a second crop, the seed being sown as late as Aug. 1.

The soil should be finely prepared as the seeds are very small, and the young plants because of their dark color are quite inconspicuous. Sow in drills one foot apart and cover thinly. Roll the ground after sowing. In order to see where the rows are a little lettuce seed should be mixed with it, say two ounces to the acre. The lettuce will plainly show the rows. Cultivate in summer so that weeds will not grow. Upon the approach of cold weather cover with any coarse litter and remove same in early spring. One quarter of a pound of seed is sufficient for an acre, says Rural New Yorker in conclusion to the foregoing.

Artificial Spring New Device for Seed Analysts

1929

New York, Jan. 2. — A method of simulating spring artificially in a modern version of the old family ice box was described today before the association of official seed analysts.

It is used for testing the germination of farm seeds at the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Immigration, Richmond. By a specially prepared chamber and an artificial refrigerator, controlled temperatures are obtained over test seeds planted in special soil boxes.

Even the breezes of spring, so far as they are useful to the fields of farmers, are preserved through the action of cold water running through the apparatus, and providing the air purification that takes place in open fields.

Spring's sunshine is reproduced in its essential effects through an electric heater whose emanations are distributed from beneath a covering of water.

The apparatus was described by Carroll M. Bass of the Virginia department of Agriculture. The seed analysts met with the American Association for the Advancement of Science, which closed its eighty-fifth annual meeting here last night. The seed men held over for a session today.

Food Oil Is Derived From Seed of Grape

1919

Newly Discovered By-product May Rival Olive Oil.

From the grape, source of wine now under a ban extra dry, is being derived a new food oil. It is pressed from the seeds which formerly were discarded. This recently discovered by-product has been tested by scientists who say that it is edible and nutritious and may become a rival of olive and cotton-seed oils for cooking and for salad dressing. The news has given comfort to growers of the vine in California, Ohio and New York State, as the preparation of the oil on a large scale may increase the profits from grape juice. Even after the oil has been pressed out the residue of the seeds is found to be of value as a feed for animals.

Dr. J. H. Shrader, who is connected with the bureau of plant industry, United States Department of Agriculture, has investigated the commercial utilization of grape seed. In a paper read before the division of industrial chemists and chemical engineers of the American Chemical Society, he suggested that all waste of this character from the vineyards and canneries be assembled at a center, so that there would be enough tonnage to make its fabrication profitable.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Jan. 3, 1920, p. 9.

Flora of Railroad Yards

1910

It has been noticed that many plants not natives of the locality are to be found growing in the neighborhood of great railroad yards.

Sometimes the seeds of these plants have been brought thousands of miles from their natural habitat. Often they flourish amid their new surroundings and gradually spread over the surrounding country. Thus trains carry unsuspected emigrants, which travel to and from every point of the compass.

In the Mississippi valley are to be found plants which within a few years past have thus been brought together; some from the Atlantic seaboard, some from the gulf region, and some from the other side of the Rocky Mountains. — Harper's Weekly.

The Deadly Grape Seed

1896

The grape seed, having been relieved of the charge of causing appendicitis, seems to have taken a new tack and is trying to do its mischievous work in another fashion.

An official of a New Jersey county is in a critical condition from the effects, it is said, of a grape seed. He ate some grapes and took great care not to swallow the seeds, but by some accident managed to inhale one, which lodged in the upper portion of his lungs. Himself a physician, he realized the necessity for care and rest, and supposed he had given the seed ample time to become encysted, which however was not the case.

There are a number of cases on record where small articles of various sorts have been drawn into the lungs with the breath. In several instances irritation had begun that ended in death. Sometimes, though, the article becomes coated with exudations from the surrounding surface and is gradually covered up, forming a lump that one may carry through the remainder of life without serious injury. Postmortem examinations have disclosed several of these cysts which had nothing to do with the death of the subject. — New York Ledger.

Eating Parrots, Albatross, Weeds, Acorns

1896

Food Can Be Almost Anything

Few of us, or, indeed, of any people, would think of eating parrots, especially if anything else could be gotten, yet the Romans esteemed them for the table, the Boston Traveller writes.

Cranes are sometimes used for food.

The American ostrich, of South America, is eaten, both flesh and eggs. The eggs of the African ostrich are used, and the flesh, when the bird is young.

The albatross, largest and strongest of birds, produces eggs that are edible.

There is a weed in this country, much cursed by all who have to do with the soil and its products, called a vulgar phrase "pussly." No one in this country would think of eating it, yet this foe of farmers and gardeners is used as a salad in Europe and Egypt.

Acorns in this country are put to no use, unless it be for swine; but in Saxon times "mast" was valued not only for herds, but for man. In times of dearth acorns were boiled and eaten by the poor in England and in France, as one species is still in Southern Europe.

Whales are no longer eaten by civilized men, but in the thirteenth century their tongues were held in great esteem in parts of Europe. Whales are now, with seals and walruses, the chief food of many inhabitants of the Arctic regions. Of the narwhal the Greenlanders eat flesh, fat and skin.

Isinglass is a strange food; it is a gelatin prepared from the air bladders of different kinds of fish from large rivers that flow into the North and Caspian Seas.